Number of Buttons
From the first Macintosh until late 2006, Apple shipped every computer with a single-button mouse, whereas most other platforms used multi-button mice. Apple and its advocates promoted single-button mice as more user-friendly, and portrayed multi-button mice as confusing for novice users and that multiple button mice interfaces introduce computer accessibility restrictive elements including right click, double click, and middle click.
On August 2, 2005, Apple introduced their Mighty Mouse multi-button mouse, which has four independently-programmable buttons and a trackball-like "scroll ball" which allows the user to scroll in any direction. Since the mouse uses touch-sensitive technology, users can treat it as a one-, two-, three-, or four-button mouse, as desired.
More recently, Apple has released a mouse with no buttons, but instead the touch sensitivity of the new Multi-Touch trackpads. This is called the Magic Mouse. Left and right click are available in their respective areas, but that space is also used when scrolling, since the mouse is simply one surface on the top. The standard optics of the Mighty Mouse appear on the underside of the new Magic Mouse.
Read more about this topic: Mouse Button
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